Tuesday, August 30, 2011

I heard a funny joke today: Q: How do you starve an Obama supporter? A: Hide his food stamps under his work boots...Jobs are out there for many of those who want them, otherwise there wouldn't be people from Mexico sneaking into this country in order to work. But why work if the Government makes it possible for you to not work?...I wanted to point out that, per the most recent Government report on personal income report, LINK, that 18% of all personal income is derived from Government transfer payments. One way to think about this is to consider that a large percentage of the taxes you pay are taken and distributed back to certain segments of the population and counted as their income. I don't know about you but I believe that's just wrong. I suppose I could dig up the portion of my income that is taken from me and given to others, who contribute nothing to our system, but I'm not ready to move out of the country to an island somewhere yet and I might do that if I knew that number.

Einstein once said that the definition of "insanity" is to keep doing the same thing, over and over again, but expecting different results. I was reminded of this when I read comments by Gerald Celente in the King World News Blog LINK Celente has huge respect from me because his vision is very similar to mine. Sometimes I like to think he must have had my phone conversations taped back in the early 2000's, even though I think he's been a super-bear long before I saw the light. Anyway, Celente referenced the fact that a couple of years ago Nouriel "Gold is in a bubble" Roubini had said that gold would never reach $1,100. How's that forecast looking? Now Roubini is out pounding the gold bubble table once again. At some point you have to consider that maybe, according to Einstein's definition, Roubini is insane...Reminds of 2002 timeframe when gold was around $375 and Robert Prechter said that the gold was move over and that it was going to collapse to $50. Haven't heard from Prechter on gold in a LONG time. Maybe he's saving a bed for Roubini in the mental ward of Bellvue Hospital in NYC...

4 comments:

I seem to recall back in 2008 or so, the gold bears were growling, quote, "when gold goes down to $400 you gold bugs are going to look really foolish!" end quote.

Some never learnSome never Want to learnSome are too stubborn or stupid to learn.

To everything there is a season and for now gold and silver are in season. There most likey will come a day when it will be financially prudent to sell/trade gold and silver for differet financial products, but that day is still a long, long way off.Let us learn from dot com stock, real estate and even gold itself (circa 1980) that nothing goes up forever, but for now the trend is your friend if you are buying precious metals.Gold bubble? Silver bubble?Hardly.Will it be prudent to sell someday?Yes, but that someday isn't here yet, and most likely won't be here for several more years, perhaps a decade or so.

Now is the time to buy on the dips and ignore the anti-gold dips.Great profits to us all!

Because of this uncertainty, regulators have acted as hesitantly as they did in the case of the Internet and housing bubbles. The Chicago Mercantile Exchange recently raised margin requirements for gold, the amount of money you can borrow to buy gold. The Singapore exchange also raised margin requirements last week. Other exchanges in other countries have not acted similarly, leading to differences that will drive gold trading to those markets.

The Commodity Futures Trading Commission, the primary regulator of the gold market in the United States, does not appear to want to act. The agency is following form, as it also refused to act forcefully when oil jumped to more than $145 a barrel in 2008. It seems hesitant to quash speculation. The commodities regulator, though, could force American exchanges to further raise margin requirements, reducing leverage and the ability of investors to buy more gold. The agency would also have to act to limit the gold acquired individually and by the ETFs. All of these measures would have to be coordinated and put into effect on a global basis.

http://gata.org/node/10363

Seems familiar...

Law implemented all sorts of laws with the Duke’s permission to fight this inflation of his paper money;

First he banned gold and silver ownership over a token amount (equal to about 5.5 oz of gold or 78 oz of silver).

Next he ordered all payment over 100 livres (about 1 oz of gold or 15 oz of silver) to be paid only with his bank notes.

As things got worse and wealth started to flow out of the country he implemented currency controls and banned the export of all gold and silver bullion.

Eric Arthur Blair aka George Orwell

"Hope" is not a valid investment strategy

Full Time Jobs Over Last 5 Years

Is Your Gold Missing?

Why Gold?

Gold is the world's oldest currency. You exchange your fiat currency (dollars, euros, yen, yuan) into gold as an insurance policy against catastrophic Central Bank and Government policies which serve to destroy the value of fiat currencies and destroy democracy.

Gold can ONLY be considered an investment to the extent that it remains significantly and historically undervalued in relation to the fiat currencies against which its value is measured. Otherwise it remains the world's oldest currency and is completely free from the counterparty risk associated with currency by Government fiat (i.e. fiat currencies rely on a Government's "full faith and credit.")

Epic Quote - "Jesse" Sent This To Me

"The world will soon wake up to the reality that everyone is broke and can collect nothing from the bankrupt, who are owed unlimited amounts by the insolvent, who are attempting to make late payments on a bank holiday in the wrong country, with an unacceptable currency, against defaulted collateral, of which nobody is sure who holds title." - Anonymous

The Basic Fundamental Problem

What's the solution?

“THERE IS NO MEANS OF AVOIDING THE FINAL COLLAPSE OF A BOOM BROUGHT ABOUT BY CREDIT EXPANSION. THE ALTERNATIVE IS ONLY WHETHER THE CRISIS SHOULD COME SOONER AS THE RESULT OF A VOLUNTARY ABANDONMENT OF FURTHER CREDIT EXPANSION OR LATER AS A FINAL AND TOTAL CATASTROPHE OF THE CURRENCY SYSTEM INVOLVED.”

Ludwig von Mises – Austrian Economist (1881- 1973)

Quote Of The Month Courtesy of "Jesse"

Unfortunately for Larry Summers, Ben Bernanke, and their friends at the BIS, they have not yet figured out how to print physical gold, silver, and other essential commodities, and the world is reaching the point where it might simply start ignoring the New York based markets with respect to essential commodities such as basic materials, oil, foodstuffs, and the like, as they become increasingly irrelevant, fraudulent, and Orwellian. And then where will the financial engineers be, except with no more excuses and no place to hide?

Great Quote From Jim Rogers On Govt CPI Reporting

JR: I mean, we have inflation now. If you go to the shop, whether it’s groceries, or education or insurance or health care, prices are going up for everything. The government lies about it in the US. Some countries lie, many countries don’t: Australia, China, India and Norway. Many countries don’t lie about it and acknowledge that we have inflation. Others lie about it, the UK and the US, but if you go shopping you know prices are up.

Q: Are you saying that the American Consumer Price Index (CPI) published by the US Bureau of Labor Statistics is a lie? JR: In my opinion, yes, of course it is. Have you looked at it? They’ve changed their accounting several times in the past few decades. When housing was 20% to 25% of the CPI and housing was going up, they didn’t count it, saying rents weren’t going up, and then when home prices started going down, they counted it. It’s the same with many things. It’s staggering some of the tortuous reasoning that the BLS has used over the past 25 or 30 years. When the price of gasoline goes up, they say it’s not really going up because it’s better gasoline, better quality, therefore you’re getting more for your money. I mean, it’s endless, the stuff that they say and for some reason people sit there, although more and more people are catching on, and accept what the government says.

Priceless Quote From Richard Russell

On Larry Summers: This doofus practically ruined Harvard when he headed it. I can't think of a worse choice to be chief economic advisor. I wouldn't trust Summers to manage a Starbucks franchise.

Quote of the Week

"The primary function of a Central Bank is to engage in the massive transfer of wealth from the middle class to the wealthy elite. The Federal Reserve was set up to do this with the blessing and support of Congress." - Dave in Denver

If you refuse to believe the above, please read "The Creature From Jekyll Island: A Second Look at the Federal Reserve" by G. Edward Griffin and then explain to me why the Senate voted down the Vitter Amendment and Congress refuses to pass a law requiring a full audit of the Fed, even though the Fed is using taxpayer-backed money to bailout Wall Street and Europe.

Quote of the Month

And very relevant in the context of yesterday's post about gold moving higher against all fiat currencies:

Just imagine what would happen if a mere ten percent of the money currently going into bonds were instead to go into gold. As in 1972, the real move has yet to begin.

- Murray Pollit, Pollit & Co.

A Picture Says It All...

www.moneyandmarkets.com

Golden ore samples produced by Eurasian Minerals

Undisclosed exploration site

The Next Reserve Currency?

1 oz. Chinese Panda

Guess who said this?

Rising prices of precious metals and other commodities are an indication of a very early stage of an endeavor to move away from paper currencies...What is fascinating is the extent to which gold still holds reign over the financial system as the ultimate source of payment.

-Alan Greenspan, 9 Sep 2009

THIS is what REAL money looks like

1 oz. Gold Eagles

Alan Greenspan said what?

“Deficit spending is simply a scheme for the ‘hidden’ confiscation of wealth. Gold stands in the way of this insidious process. It stands as a protector of property rights.”

From "Gold and Economic Freedom" a 1966 Essay by Alan Greenspan

About Me

I spent many years working in various analytic jobs and trading on Wall Street. For nine of those years, I traded junk bonds for a large bank. I have an MBA from the University of Chicago, with a concentration in accounting and finance.
Currently I co-manage a precious metals and mining stock investment fund in Denver.
My goal is to help people understand and analyze what is really going on in our financial system and economy.